Sydney makes the short list to host 2019 Scotties Tournament of Hearts

Officials from Curling Canada were on Cape Breton Island Wednesday touring facilities and surrounding communities before they decide who will host the Canadian Curling Women’s Championship.

Centre 200 in Sydney is seen on Wednesday, Sept. 6, 2017.

Sydney is once again bidding for the Scotties Tournament of Hearts. They fell short to Penticton, B.C., to host the 2018 event, but Centre 200 manger Paul MacDonald hopes 2019 will be their year.

“We met with Curling Canada and had a debriefing from the previous bid and we took that to heart,” says MacDonald. “Everybody again worked hard to pull this together.”

Curling Canada general manager Gordon McNabb has met with the bid committee, who took him on a tour of the venue and community.

“You need the volunteer element. There’s got to be volunteers. And at the same time, are we going to sell tickets? So far Sydney has demonstrated that we are going to be able to sell tickets,” McNabb says.

More than 900 pre-tournament tickets have already been sold. The Scotties will be televised on TSN, putting Cape Breton in the national spotlight and dumping up to $12 million into the local economy.

“It’s also an opportunity for us to showcase Cape Breton Island as a whole and Nova Scotia as a destination, so this is a week-long plus of exposure for our community,” says Cape Breton Regional Municipality Mayor Cecil Clarke.

It’s still unknown who Sydney will have to defeat to earn the right to host the event.

“Some communities don’t want us to (say), so we’ve taken that approach that we just keep it under our hat until such time we make the announcement,” says McNabb.

Curling Canada says a final decision will be made by the end of September, with an official announcement being made in the host city’s town in October.